Violent attacks targeting Christian communities occur in Nigeria about eight times a day on average and the government has been “largely ineffective” at stopping them, Ryan Brown, the CEO of the Christian aid organization Open Doors, told Breitbart News.
Brown described Christian persecution in the country – which is upwards of 40 percent Christian – as “well documented” and disproportionate compared to the violence faced by other religious communities in the country. He called for the Nigerian government and its allies to work swiftly to take measures to change the rising tide of mass killing and displacement in the country.
Open Doors is a Christian human rights organization that works on the ground in dozens of countries to offer humanitarian aid, prayer, and advocacy for vulnerable and persecuted Christians. It maintains a presence in Nigeria through local partnerships that, in addition to making it a credible source of information on the reality on the ground in Nigeria, also help it offer services such as survival training, trauma care, relief aid and economic empowerment projects to persecution survivors.
The group also publishes its annual World Watch List documenting the most dangerous places on earth to be a Christian. In its 2025 edition, Nigeria was ranked number seven, higher than Afghanistan, China, Saudi Arabia, and India.
“Across Nigeria in recent years, on average there have been 8 violent attacks per day. The Middle Belt, particularly Benue and Plateau state, continues to experience frequent deadly attacks,” Brown explained to Breitbart News in written remarks. The “Middle Belt” region of Nigeria spans across the center of the country, where the majority-Muslim north of the country meets the majority-Christian south. Brown provided a detailed list of recent attacks in the area:
From April 2023 to January 2024, there were 98 attacks on Christian villages in Mangu LGA Plateau state alone, causing significant loss of life and property. This past Easter, at least 43 people were killed in Bassa LGA. In June 2025, Christian communities in Guma LGA in Benue state are reported to have faced at least six attacks between 8 and 14 June, which left more than 218 dead and thousands displaced.
“The evidence of targeted violence against Christians in Nigeria is well documented. In October, the Islamist group connected with ISIS sent a clear message about their intention to target Christians in Africa declaring they must convert or die,” he explained. “Last year alone, 3,100 of the 4,476 Christians killed worldwide for their faith were in Nigeria. Nigeria also leads globally in Christians abducted for faith reasons.”
The alarming situation that Christians face in Nigeria – routine raids of villages featuring mass abductions, slaughter, and burning down of homes and attacks that locals describe as systematic attempts to erase the local populations at the hands of Fulani “herdsmen” jihadists – attracted global attention in recent weeks as President Donald Trump announced that he would place the country on the State Department’s list of Countries of Particular Concern (CPC) for religious freedom.
“Christianity is facing an existential threat in Nigeria. Thousands of Christians are being killed. Radical Islamists are responsible for this mass slaughter,” President Trump wrote on October 31 in a message on his website, Truth Social. Trump later added that he may choose to send the military “guns-a-blazing” into Nigeria to “completely wipe out the Islamic Terrorists” attacking Christians, prompting condemnation from the government of Nigerian President Bola Tinubu.
“The characterization of Nigeria as religiously intolerant does not reflect our national reality,” Tinubu said in a statement the day after Trump revealed the CPC designation, “nor does it take into consideration the consistent and sincere efforts of the government to safeguard freedom of religion and beliefs for all Nigerians.”
Nigerian Information Minister Mohammed Idris similarly declared last week, “for us to be characterized as a country that is intolerant of religion is absolutely false. What we have are extremists trying to divide the country.”
“The research is clear that if you are a Christian, you are 6.5 times more likely to be killed and 5.1 times more likely to be abducted in Nigeria,” Brown observed, contrary to the Tinubu government’s claims.
“Our extensive field research, verified through multiple sources including our robust partner network, confirms that Christians are being disproportionately targeted in many regions,” Brown noted. “Even with this clear evidence, we need to move beyond the debate and defensive posturing. We need governments to take concrete steps toward protecting all its citizens, regardless of their faith.”
Brown credited the Tinubu government with taking “increased actions” in the northeast of the country, where the traditional threat to Christian communities in the past decade has been the jihadist terrorist group Boko Haram, which attempted to evolve into an Islamic State affiliate in 2015 and has since splintered.
“We also hope the government will show the same vigor to bring justice through arresting and prosecuting militant Fulani members, who were responsible for 55% of recorded Christian deaths between 2019 and 2023,” Brown added.
File/Ondo State governor Rotimi Akeredolu (3rd L) points to blood the stained floor after an attack by gunmen at St. Francis Catholic Church in Owo town, southwest Nigeria on June 5, 2022. Gunmen with explosives stormed a Catholic church and opened fire in southwest Nigeria on June 5, killing “many” worshippers and wounding others, the government and police said. (AFP via Getty Images)
For years, the government has insisted that much of the Middle Belt violence was committed by unspecified “bandits” or “unknown gunmen,” rather than Fulani jihadist terrorists seeking to deliberately exterminate Christians. Christians on the ground have rejected that description and denounced the government for trying to silence them.
“People were even warned not to say they are Fulani herdsmen who have been causing these atrocities such that when you open the general media they are talking about bandits — bandits or they say ‘unknown gunmen’ or things like that,” Father Ihyula, a Catholic priest in Benue state, at the heart of the Middle Belt, told Breitbart News in 2013. “So you read about bandits. It’s rubbish: They are Fulani men going about with cattle and with guns and killing people and the government won’t do anything about it.”
On Thursday, the Nigerian newspaper Premium Times quoted anonymous locals in the Middle Belt stating that government officials had threatened them not to report or publicize jihadist attacks. Another Nigerian newspaper, Vanguard, reported on Saturday that attacks by “armed marauders” in Benue had “intensified” since President Trump’s designation.
“Despite this international attention, the attacks have not abated,” the newspaper observed. “Instead, the perpetrators appear emboldened, launching fresh assaults on vulnerable communities in Benue State.”
“However, the attacks had no religious undertones but just armed herders attacking indigens,” the newspaper added providing no evidence to support the claim.
“Local police and security responses remain largely ineffective with complaints by locals that they arrive late on the scene and that arrests rarely if ever amount to prosecutions of the perpetrators,” Brown told Breitbart News, sharing the status of the situation as Open Doors has documented it.
“Christian communities are often defenseless against the sophisticated weaponry Fulani militants carry, and although some Christians have tried to defend themselves,” he noted, “many are reluctant to do so after the Supreme Court of Nigeria sentenced a Christian farmer to death when after he was stabbed by his attacker he fought back resulting in the death of his attacker.”
“We respect every nation’s sovereignty and hope that the Trump administration and the Nigerian Government will collaborate constructively to identify the most effective strategies for addressing Islamist insurgency,” Brown concluded. “Most importantly, we urge the Nigerian Government and the international community to take immediate and concrete action to address the needs of Christians who have been disproportionately affected by the violence.”
He added that Americans concerned about the crisis in Nigeria can “raise awareness, pray, and support organizations assisting Nigerian Christians with relief and trauma care.”
Read the full article here